“POTS” is an industry-recognized acronym for “plain, old telephone service.” A POTS line is a telephone line, with a telephone number, like the standard ones subscribed to by residences and many small businesses. POTS lines are switched services. Telephone calls made from a POTS line are placed on the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), which is the public telephone service (i.e., the telephone system). When a call is made, the call is coupled through one or more telephone lines and one or more switches to its desired terminus. When a caller places a telephone call, the call is connected to a switch at the central office in the caller's area. The central office is the location, usually a building, that houses telecommunications switching equipment or trafficking systems. At the central office, the call is placed over a central-office trunk, which in turn terminates at another central office in the receiver's area. The central-office trunk is the communications path between the two central offices. After the call is received by the central office in the receiver's area, the call is routed to the recipient.
Modern switching has far surpassed the day when human local operators connected calls to local residences and businesses at the central office. Today's switching involves the use of powerful computers and complex electrical circuits and electronics. The modern central office not only performs traditional switching of analog voice signals, but supports digital voice, text, image and data communications via ISDN (short for “integrated services digital network” which is the digital end to end telecommunications network).
Modern central office switches offers subscribers a wealth of basic and advanced features including: abbreviated dialing, alarm call, call rerouting-busy, call waiting, call rerouting-no answer, call charge indicator, toll-free calling, conference calling, direct dialing to extensions, emergency call area, hot lines, call tracing, incoming call block, individual call record, outgoing traffic limitations, override block, subscriber with special services, subscriber priority, and three-way calling. Advanced features are provided to subscribers whose systems are equipped with ISDN Basic Rate (2B+D) or Primary (23B+D) Interfaces. Advanced features include automatic call-back, call forwarding, call hold, call pickup, call rerouting when busy, call waiting, charge handling, data transmission, dedicated connection, display information, incoming call block, multiline hunt groups, user groups and closed groups. Since the World Wide Web can be accessed via the telephone lines, future services available to telephone subscribers at the central office switch are imponderable.
While all these technological solutions provide valuable options to the subscriber, they have also provided new problems-coordination and administration of these services. A telephone subscriber may want one individual caller to be treated in one manner, and another individual caller to be treated in another manner. For instance, a subscriber may want to allow some individuals but not all callers to ring the subscriber's line. The subscriber may want to allow unfettered access to the subscriber's line for his or her parents, but not a telemarketer. The subscriber may want to be protected against automatic dialers but make sure his or her friends have the ability to place a telephone call to the subscriber undisturbed.
For instance, a subscriber may want to allow a salesperson to call him or her at home, but prevent the salesperson from making follow-up calls, once it is determined that the service or commodity is not desired. Alternatively, a subscriber may want to give someone temporary access with the option of later determining whether they would like to receive that individuals telephone calls. For instance, a subscriber may want to give out a phone number at the beginning of a personal relationship, but deny access to the private line after the relationship is over. Another option is directly routing callers to a voice mailbox should the phone be busy, so that subscriber is undisturbed while other callers that the subscriber may deem of higher priority are put through to call-waiting and are allowed to disrupt the phone call. It is possible the subscriber would like to have some of his or her phone calls forwarded to the residence of friends to be visited that evening, but not others. The telephonic system is programmable so that the subscriber is provided the option of having some of the phone calls forwarded to a cellular phone, or a voice over the Internet connection.
The subscriber may want some callers to receive certain personal announcements, but not others. For instance, the subscriber may want to give directions to the subscriber's residence to people who will be visiting the subscriber's residence tomorrow, leave a reminder to the subscriber's spouse to pick up milk on the way home from work, and leave yet another message to a co-worker that a particular project has been completed. Or, if the subscriber's time is valuable, he may want to charge particular callers fees to speak to the subscriber or access certain -services or information. In the business setting, a subscriber may want to have the ability to alter whether a particular person receives a pager, voice mail, e-mail with a voice attachment, or is put through on a voice line. U.S. Pat. No. 5,276,731 entitled “Method and Apparatus for Handling Incoming Telephone Calls” discloses the use of Personal Identification Numbers as applied to the general field of telephony, but does not disclose using the Internet.
The permutations are seemingly endless, and are limited only by the number of potential callers and services provided. Traditionally, the subscriber calls the phone company and selects what service they want. They may be interviewed by a live person at the telephone company, or alternatively, may be put through a voice mail box which will activate certain services by traditional voice or touch-pad recognition. Not only is this process cumbersome and laborious, but the data needs to be saved on a computer, adding additional hardware cost to the central office. These computers may not only be expensive, but may be of a proprietary nature in which the telecommunication company would like to limit access. What is needed is a way to coordinate and arrange all these options offered by the telephone company so that they may be put at the subscriber's finger tips.